Bit of a mixed up tea this Tuesday

I guess by now you all may have heard that Vancouver is under a bit of snow.

I KNOW! RIGHT!?! My poor little garden flowers…which might be made for the snow…but still.

There really wasn’t anything to do about it but go shopping and have some tea.

Actually, I should have been working and Clover should have been studying for her midterm…but whatever. 😀

You all probably noticed that my child has been looking a bit blonder lately. She’s got that ombre thing happening, you know, where she looks like an alien with tin foil all over her hair and can listen to BBC Radio thru her teeth for 30 minutes, and now, the side effect of all that free broadcasting thru teeth, is that she looks completely washed out in my Chanel Coco Rouge lipstick, which she loves to nick for an evening out.

So high on C’s priority list was finding a red lipstick for evening which actually looks good on her. And for C, it has to be organic, cruelty free and affordable. So we did the lipstick run-around and when she was finished trying seventeen different shades and five different brands, she ended up looking very pink around her chin and cheeks from the Kleenex and lipstick smears.

By the end of the lipstick adventure I was dying for a cup of tea and C was feeling starving so we stopped at a new cafe called Faubourg Paris Café and I ordered my Earl Gray and C a ham and cheese croissant.

This is a lovely cafe with a patisserie where they make fabulous pastries, but the Mariage Freres Earl Gray tea they served was just way too weak and flavourless for me. And I did let it steep for a long time.

On the other hand, the cafe is lovely and bright and twinkly with loads of crystal drop chandeliers and pendant lamps, there is a gently projected movie on one wall and the chairs, with the Lucite centres and painted feathers, are lovely.

So back at home, I still wanted my lovely, fragrant Earl Gray and so brewed myself a cup from my super secret, only for me stash of loose tea from Fortnum and Mason and I chose this sweet little cup to have it in.

I love this frosty rose from Royal Southerland and it seems like a fine homage to this ridiculous February snow.

So I had my tea and C got into her sweats and her cue cards and I sat down at the kitchen table to think about my personal journal and see if I could come up with a page.

You know, this page was so hard won. I loved the words “experimental genius” and tried to form a thought from among the other words on the page but it just wouldn’t come and wouldn’t come…and I’d been staring at it off and on for about a week now.

So I sat there and had a little meditation over the page and suddenly there the words were! Right there all along!

The words say: “await the experimental genius in the magnificent fabric of the mind’s eye today”

I saw the experimental genius as swirling colours. Bold and bright colours, mixing and rushing in, taking over an empty space.

But I also saw the experimental genius as small and shy and quiet and softly moving in on silent wings, and you turn around and there he is. So suddenly I was painting an owl. A Little Owl. One of the smallest owls out there.

And then I dulled down the magnificent fabric with a little bit of soft, white tissue paper, a little imperfection, so we don’t take ourselves too seriously as artists. 😀

Sharing tea with Terri and Martha and Sandi and Bernedeen, and, just after I drive C to the uni to take her midterm, I’ll be around to catch up with everyone.